22.9.2006   

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

C 228/14

Prior notification of a concentration

(Case COMP/M.4350 — Hewlett Packard/Mercury Interactive)

(2006/C 228/07)

(Text with EEA relevance)

1.

On 15 September 2006, the Commission received a notification of a proposed concentration pursuant to Article 4 and following a referral pursuant to Article 4(5) of Council Regulation (EC) No 139/2004 (1) by which the undertaking Hewlett Packard Company (‘HP’, USA) acquires within the meaning of Article 3(1)(b) of the Council Regulation control of the whole of the undertaking Mercury Interactive Corporation (‘Mercury’, USA) by way of purchase of shares.

2.

The business activities of the undertakings concerned are:

—

for undertaking HP: Provision of IT infrastructure products, personal computing and access devices, global IT services, and imaging and printing;

—

for undertaking Mercury: Provision of application testing software and IT governance software.

3.

On preliminary examination, the Commission finds that the notified transaction could fall within the scope of Regulation (EC) No 139/2004. However, the final decision on this point is reserved.

4.

The Commission invites interested third parties to submit their possible observations on the proposed operation to the Commission.

Observations must reach the Commission not later than 10 days following the date of this publication. Observations can be sent to the Commission by fax (fax No (32-2) 296 43 01 or 296 72 44) or by post, under reference number COMP/M.4350 — Hewlett Packard/Mercury Interactive, to the following address:

European Commission

Directorate-General for Competition

Merger Registry

J-70

B-1049 Bruxelles/Brussel

(1)  OJ L 24, 29.1.2004, p. 1.